Canonical Adds Web Apps to Ubuntu

New Ubuntu Web Apps feature will allow popular online applications to be launched from the desktop outside the browser.

Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth announced at OSCON last week that a new feature is being added to the Ubuntu desktop. This feature, called Ubuntu Web Apps, allow users the ability to use popular online applications, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google+, as desktop applications. According to Canonical blogger Steve George, "the apps can even take advantage of Ubuntu's new HUD system, making it even easier to navigate."

Ubuntu Web Apps will be included officially in the next release of Ubuntu 12.10, Quantal Quetzal, in October. However, according to Canonical, the feature will soon be available as a preview for Ubuntu 12.04 LTS. About 40 Web Apps are currently complete, with more to come.

The Ubuntu Web Apps feature is a plugin for the Firefox browser that lets web pages be launched outside the browser window. Ubuntu Web Apps runs only on the Unity desktop and its source code will be available as open source on the Canonical Launchpad project management service. You can read more about the feature on this Canonical blog post.